OLD pro Democrats who’d been in awe of Sen. Hillary Clinton‘s perfect campaign believe she made her first serious blunder last Monday by indicating to CBS’s Katie Couric that her election as president is inevitable.

Couric asked, “How disappointed will you be” if she doesn’t win; Clinton replied: “Well, it will be me.” “Clearly,” the CBS anchor persisted, “you have considered” the “possibility of losing”? “No, I haven’t,” said Clinton. “So you never even consider the possibility?” “I don’t. I don’t.”

A footnote: Bill Clinton, campaigning for his wife in Iowa the next day, stunned Democratic insiders by claiming he’d opposed the Iraq war “from the beginning.” In fact, shortly after the US invasion of Iraq, the ex-president declared: “I supported the president when he asked the Congress for authority to stand up against weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.”

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STRATEGISTS for Mitt Romney‘s presidential campaign were actually pleased that fast-rising Mike Huckabee moved ahead of Romney in the Rasmussen poll in Iowa, eliminating surprise if Huckabee finishes first in the Jan. 3 caucuses.

A Huckabee victory in Iowa would kill Romney’s plans to win the first two 2008 tests in Iowa and New Hampshire, followed by sweeping the board in all other primary states. Instead, the contest could extend through the Feb. 5 primaries, with Rudy Giuliani given a chance in the high-population state primaries that day.

The consolation for Romney strategists is that a Huckabee win in Iowa would no longer be a shock that could stampede the process.

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CONTRARY to published reports, there is zero possibility that Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour will name 70-year- old retired federal Judge Charles Pickering to the Senate vacancy created by Sen. Trent Lott’s resignation.

Barbour feels Mississippi’s tradition is for US senators holding their seats for many years, not temporary seat warmers. Judge Pickering’s 44-year- old son, Rep. Chip Pickering, would be the leading prospect to be selected if he had not announced he would leave Congress because of his family’s needs.